


Erebus

by wearethewitches



Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Aged-Up Character(s), Azula (Avatar) Needs a Hug, Character Study, F/M, Fluff and Smut, Geographical Isolation, Gratuitous Smut, Older Man/Younger Woman, Southern Water Tribe, but what is pwp if not also a character study?, i wrote this for the smut no lies
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-06
Updated: 2021-01-06
Packaged: 2021-03-17 12:14:24
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,039
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28599789
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wearethewitches/pseuds/wearethewitches
Summary: Later, Azula is imprisoned in the South Pole.
Relationships: Azula/Hakoda (Avatar)
Comments: 3
Kudos: 32





	Erebus

They arrive with Azula wrapped in chains.

‘The timetable had to be moved up—she keeps getting released by Fire Nation supremists,’ says Sokka, muttering despondently. He doesn’t have any strength left to be energetic, which worries Hakoda more than the Fire Princess does. Sokka has always been the one to shout when things have gone sour—not fade.

‘We’ve not told anyone where we’ve taken her,’ the Avatar, Aang, tells Hakoda with a serious expression. At eighteen, he’s just coming into his long limbs and losing the last traces of boyhood. ‘Zuko is trusting us to keep her safe.’

‘And to keep everyone else safe from her, until we get a better prison.’ Katara interjects wisely.

Hakoda looks down at the bundle at their feet. At some point, someone has forcibly wrapped the Fire Princess up in a large bundle of furs and blankets, before wrapping the chains around her again. It's not a sound tactic, unless she’s wearing a straight-jacket beneath all that.

Looking to Katara, he says in a low voice, ‘I will watch over her. I trust you both to look after the tribe in my absence.’ Katara is twenty years old—much like the Fire Princess—and has been handling political matters with the Fire Nation since Ozai’s defeat, while likewise Sokka has learned the ways of the chieftains under him and gone through his official trials of manhood; they already make a formidable team and Hakoda would trust no others to look after their people.

_…except maybe Bato._ But that’s another matter entirely.

Hakoda had been making arrangements to go on a ‘solo’ sojourn into the tundra since Sokka told him of the plan to get Azula out of the Fire Nation. Fire Lord Zuko had been pretty clear in his letter—delivered through Aang—that the Southern Water Tribe is the only place he trusts to keep his sister alive and well, assured that they alone would not use her as a political pawn against the Fire Nation during the ongoing reparation efforts. He’d already built an igloo a fair distance away from camp with Katara’s assistance and packed it full of supplies, readying himself for the arrival of his undoubtedly volatile prisoner.

‘Come here,’ he orders, before enfolding his children in an embrace. They are his pride and joy—he would do anything for them. ‘Lead well.’

‘We will!’

‘We’ll make you proud, Dad!’

And then it is time.

* * *

A large part of living in isolation, such as they do in the South Pole, is being prepared for the many untold eventualities. With this in mind, Hakoda had very clear with the Avatar that Azula would need access to her firebending.

Aang had been unsure. ‘She’s dangerous, Chief Hakoda. She could _hurt_ you.’

‘Princess Azula is not used to this climate,’ Hakoda said, not ungently. ‘Warmth is the difference between life and death here. If you wish to put limitations on this, I need to know she can at least access this inner fire that firebenders speak of.’

‘It’s less of an inner fire and more of a constant awareness of heat, but-’ Aang babbled good-naturedly about firebending for a good two minutes before winding down, promising to adjust Azula’s control over the aspect of fire. Hakoda’s blessing gains the Fire Princess an internal heat, but an inability to manifest it outside her body.

Once the Avatar and his children have begun heading south towards the village, Hakoda transfers the still-bound Fire Princess onto a sled, ignoring the subtle glare she sends his way through narrowed eyes. Her suspicion is clear to him.

‘We will discuss things at our new home,’ Hakoda informs her plainly, before doing her a favour she’ll be unlikely to be pleased with, covering her face from the wind and sky. _Explain to her the dangers of even the most unlikely of weathers in clear terms,_ he tells himself.

The journey to the igloo is made in silence.

* * *

Azula is a burst of colour.

Her hair is darker than any of his Tribesmen—blacker. Her eyes are gold and Hakoda still finds himself perturbed at times when he meets her gaze, expecting a familiar brown, blue or at least an earthy green. She is unashamedly Fire Nation, keeping her red robes and showing little to no discomfort in the cold.

Hakoda lays down the rules the first night in the igloo. Most are things taught to their young ones—like be wary of chasms hidden by snow and never go out alone—but others are more specific. Like, ‘no assassination attempts’. That rule is broken many, many times.

The first time Hakoda awakens to a stolen knife aimed at his neck, he jerks to life and grapples her, rolling onto her body and using his weight against her. The Fire Princess is smaller than she seems, with a body to match. She goes down easy, spitting insults all the way. This happens six times over half as many days, before Azula finally seems to understand that Hakoda was not leader of the Water Tribe Warriors for no reason.

‘I would have given up my place, if that had been so.’

‘Weak,’ Azula grits her teeth. ‘You are their Chief! You should always be better than the peasants!’

‘Water Tribe has no peasants—only more tribe.’

He teaches her how to stalk fish-foxes and walk through a field of walrus-seals without disturbing them. Azula takes to the lessons with a determination only beaten in Hakoda’s mind by Sokka, who was almost too eager to jump into things where Azula is rightfully wary. She asks questions— _are walrus-seals edible?_ —and isn’t shy about questioning him when his explanations don’t make sense to her Fire Nation mind.

‘But a blizzard is the perfect cover! You could sneak up behind the backs of your waiting enemies and deliver results!’ she argues with him over the fire. Hakoda swipes his hand through the air.

‘No. Blizzards can freeze a man to death in minutes. They can blow snows over hidden ravines and if you’re even more unlucky, hail can rip through your body and kill you—either excruciatingly slowly or _instantly_.’

‘I won’t freeze and if I know the terrain well, I’ll know when not to climb over the stupid ravines,’ Azula counters. ‘And it’s just hail!’

Hakoda calmly cups an imaginary ball of snow, the size of a newborn isopup. ‘This is how big the hail can get.’

He wins that argument.

* * *

As if prophesised by their argument, a month-long blizzard sets in shortly afterwards. Hakoda ventures out only twice, emptying what traps he’d set up and liberating the closest set of bushes of their berries. Azula remains behind both times when he usually might take her with him and the first night he returns, for a long moment he actually thinks she’s abandoned the igloo.

But then she comes back inside the igloo from behind him with red in her bare hands and Hakoda doesn’t look when she sets to boiling rags in a pot that she’d laid claim to near the beginning of their isolation. He sets about securing the entrance, attracting her attention when he puts a crate in front of it.

‘Why?’ she asks.

‘Predators,’ he explains, ‘We won’t be the only ones seeking shelter from the storm. We’ll go outside sparingly.’

Azula hums, then says something surprising. ‘You aren’t completely useless.’

‘A compliment? Have you finally lost your mind, princess?’ Hakoda jests, lip quirking when he sees her roll her eyes. He mellows when he sees how content she is. ‘Azula?’

She jerks. ‘What?’

Unsure if his question will break the tentative accord of positivity they’re sharing, Hakoda asks her, ‘Are you happy?’

‘I’ve never been happy, Chief Hakoda,’ she replies almost instantly, before pausing. ‘I do admit, however…that I am somewhat at ease. Your life is simple because to invite complexity is to invite danger, living as you do.’

‘What do you miss?’ he prompts.

‘Writing,’ Azula says, ‘I was no beautiful calligrapher like Zuko, but I haven’t written a single document in years. I was a commander in my father’s Navy—there was paperwork. I truly must be turning over a new leaf, if I’m missing _that.’_

Hakoda chuckles. ‘I’m one of the few who can read anything more than our native languages, in the South. I made a point of making the older children learn, but few took to it when they knew they would be fighters in the war.’

‘Your children can read.’

‘Sokka is an intellectual, not that he’d tell you that,’ says Hakoda, sitting down opposite Azula on his preferred hide. ‘Katara only wanted to keep up with him. Sibling rivalry, as I’m sure you’d understand.’

‘I do,’ Azula admits, ‘though probably not as you would imagine it. My father pit Zuko and I against each other since early childhood and my general demeanour never helped.’

‘Oh, what demeanour? The one that likes to stab poor old men?’

The Fire Princess scoffs. ‘You survive each attempt. Don’t play coy now, Chief.’

‘Hakoda,’ he offers. ‘You can call me Hakoda, princess.’

Azula eyes him carefully, lips pursing. ‘Why do you offer your name to me?’ she asks him, her voice flat.

‘Would you rather address me as a superior or a person?’ Hakoda returns, leaving the choice up to her. After a long moment, she replies.

‘I am your prisoner… _chief._ I am yours in perpetuity and nothing will change that.’

The reminder stings for a moment, before Hakoda admits their reality and nods, accepting her decision. Readying himself for a quiet night, he reaches for his project of the month—an elk-moose coat in a different style from normal. Where he usually might make it the lining of a set of trousers or pair of boots, Hakoda had decided that Azula deserved more clothes than just her Fire Nation clothes—which had become increasingly ragged from the long months of constant wear. He idly wonders if she had a full wardrobe in whatever place Fire Lord Zuko held her in.

That being said, Hakoda isn’t especially talented at sewing. He knows Azula watches him go at it sometimes, too, so he won’t pretend either. The cloak is squared, with thick stitches on either side and a hood, which was the most complex part—and tonight, Hakoda realises, there’s nothing more to be done except gift it.

‘…is something wrong?’ Azula asks, wary. ‘You’ve been staring at that thing for far too long.’

Hakoda clears his throat, sitting upright and putting away his whalebone needle and thread, inspecting the coat for what it is—a poncho of a different name. He wordlessly throws it over the fire, Azula catching it with a scathing splutter. He watches her inspect it.

‘A bag?’

‘A coat,’ Hakoda corrects, moving around the fire to set it right in her lap, ignoring how she stiffens at his closeness. He thinks of Katara—they’re around the same age. ‘You can wear it over your own things. Try it on.’

‘I don’t want to.’

‘Too bad—it’s yours and I want to check that it fits.’

Azula makes another wordless noise of scorn, placing her hand against his chest to push him away. It’s like a brand—a warmth that seeps into his furs right to the skin in the shape of her hand as he leans back. He watches her pull it over her head, hair getting caught under the edges. Hakoda has seen her scream at her combs when they get caught in the snarls of her unkempt hair, made even worse whenever she goes outside. It’s been almost unbearable to look at, sometimes.

‘Here,’ he reaches, untucking it for her and deftly ignoring how she stiffens again, pulling up the hood. It’s over-large, which is all well and good for when she actually needs it. ‘Comfortable?’

The Fire Princess adjusts the torso of her new coat, fingers grazing the triangular edges over her arms. Hakoda is surprised at how well the hide offsets her red sleeves. Her hair catches his eye again and he gestures to it, offering himself.

‘I can braid it, if you want-’

_‘No!’_ She bares her teeth, eyes wild as she leans towards him threateningly. A moment later, she seems to realise what she’s doing, scurrying back around the fire to sit on his usual spot. Hakoda sees the deep suction of her chest as she tries to control her breathing and realises he’s made a mistake.

‘I’m sorry,’ he says, sincere. Azula meets his eyes—gold locking with brown.

‘Don’t be.’

* * *

The next day, the Fire Princess sits down next to him with her back straight and her chin raised high, whalebone comb in hand. Her expression is one of challenge and Hakoda doesn’t back down, drawing the comb through her hair one lock at a time until it’s like silk beneath his fingers. With every brush, Azula relaxes beneath him and an absurd part of him thinks of what she’d look like in his bed—a thought that doesn’t leave him, even as he pulls those sky-black strands into a tie at the base of her head, braiding it evenly to pin in a twist around the knot.

‘Practical,’ he murmurs, wishing he’d taken more time with it. ‘Beautiful.’

‘Am I?’ she purrs, glancing back at him with a wicked smirk. A very large part of Hakoda realises he’s made a mistake, here—though he doesn’t yet know how. Azula inspects her hair with a free hand, wispy strands around the front of her head coming out as her fingers brush over them—remnants of a fringe long grown out.

The next day, she takes her hair out and asks it of him again. Hakoda hands are still, even as his mind whirs, wondering what tactic this is. Because it has to be a tactic. Azula is too smug—too calculating. There is something that Hakoda is missing, here.

A thought occurs to him later that week, when Azula undresses down to her shirt and takes that much longer to get into her furs for sleep, that the Fire Princess might be a bit more perceptive than even Hakoda suspected. She catches him looking under his eyelashes at her pale legs, that damnable _smirk_ reappearing before she goes to bed. Hakoda sleeps in his furs that night and thinks long and hard.

She wants to play a game, does she?

Well, never let it be said that Hakoda backs down from a challenge.

The next day after breakfast, he sets to heating a large pot of snow water he’d decided was worth the sacrifice, the usually quiet morning interrupted by Azula’s shocked ‘What are you doing?’ when he takes off all his outer clothes.

Left in only his underwear, Hakoda takes the pot of snow water and casually starts using a towel to wash. ‘It’s bath-time,’ he says with zero irony, though his own mischievous smile is released when he sees Azula ogling at his chest.

‘What are your tattoos?’ she asks.

‘Marks of bravery, of my chieftainship, my family,’ he tells her easily, pointing out each in turn. He has classic Southern Water Tribe designs of waves, a canoe and various small animals below his pectorals going down to his hips, representing the pilgrimage he took during his trials of manhood, as well as a series of snarling wolves running rough-shed over his back, for the Grey Wolf Tribe—his mother tribe, the culture he descends from amongst the many lost, homogenised into one.

Azula says, ‘They are masterful works. Very dull, however.’

‘Dull?’ Hakoda queries, before watching her remove her coat and reds, going all the way down to the bandages around her breasts he hadn’t even realised she wore. _I’ve miscalculated,_ he thinks in dawning horror as he watches her unbind, turning around at the last moment to reveal her own artwork. Hakoda forgets his bath, coming close behind her to peer at the bright orange dragons etched onto her back.

‘Exquisite,’ he murmurs, impressed. His heart pounds inside his chest. The tattoos may be gorgeous, but Hakoda is acutely aware that she is topless in front of him, a familiar ache growing in his loins and-

She turns.

A hand glides over his shoulder, sliding up over his neck to his hair, grasping it tightly as he’s drawn downwards, lips crashing on his own. Hakoda takes the implicit permission for what it is, reaching to pull her onto his lap, feeling Azula wrap her arms around him to tangle in his hair. She tastes like fire and the berries they had to break their fast, hot against his lips. That _tongue-_

Hakoda knows what he wants. While one hand stays firmly at her waist, fingers pressing into the bones of her ribcage as the other hand climbs to the soft suppleness of her breast. She gasps into his mouth, gripping his hair that much tighter. Hakoda grunts at the sting of it, feeling his cock rise to the occasion. Neither of them likes to play the long game, it seems.

Azula pulls her mouth from his, eventually, saying in a low, pretty voice, ‘Would you like to fuck me, Chief Hakoda?’

‘Only if you drop the ‘chief’,’ he replies, lifting her with ease and walking them over to his raised bed, placing her down beneath him. Leaning over her like this, he gets to properly look at her for the first time. _Beautiful,_ he thinks again, faintly worried over the outline of bone he can see beyond taught muscle and paler flesh than he was expecting.

Abruptly, she speaks, her words dousing him like cold water. ‘I’ve never done this before.’

Hakoda falters. ‘How?’

‘I’ve been imprisoned since I was fourteen,’ she breathes, not letting him look anywhere but her. ‘Did you think I’d have anything less than the best guards watching me at all times? For all you are my warden, Hakoda, you are the first taste of freedom I’ve had in living memory.’

‘This isn’t right,’ he says, opinion twisting. He might be willing to fuck her, but she’s right in that she is his prisoner. ‘You’re- you’re a girl.’

‘I’m no more a girl than you are a boy,’ she returns, hissing with restrained anger, ‘I know what I want.’

‘What do you want?’ Hakoda asks her. She answers him by pressing her knee to the tent in his underwear, gloriously triumphant when he groans, head bowing to touch her own.

‘I want _you,_ ’ she finishes, with all the demand of a royal. ‘Now, get your head out of the clouds and between my legs, _immediately.’_

‘As her highness orders.’

Hakoda will remember the noises she makes for the rest of his life—gasping and shouting his name, begging and writhing beneath him before finally going quiet as he impales her, rutting deep into her tight, rosy cunt. Her nails dig into his shoulders and when she comes, he keeps going until he does, too, listening to her plead for him to go stronger, _harder. Please, please, please-_

He’ll think the depressing things later, like how she’s the same age as his daughter and how he’s her guard, her only taste of freedom in captivity—but for now, he worships her body and takes his pleasure in her, eating out of her cunt and holding her head when she sucks his cock for the first time. He watches the dragons on her back flash in the firelight as he ploughs in from behind and begs for the end when she rides him on the hard ground, her body like a living sun as she goads and teases, in control of her life for the first time in years.

It must be hard being a prisoner of such high standing. The only thing that is her own is her body—and she uses it well.

* * *

The blizzard ends and so does their isolation. The first time Sokka visits, nigh on six months since Hakoda first left, the elder man nearly has a heart attack wondering whether his son will discover his indiscretions. Azula acts like her cocky self—keeping her sarcastic demeanour even as she mellows over time—and Sokka scoffs more than once, delivering them some needed supplies that had become scarce.

One such supply is tea.

‘It’s for you,’ Sokka says to Azula, ‘Katara said you might appreciate it. Says she’s sorry she didn’t realise sooner that you wouldn’t have any.’

‘What is it?’ Hakoda asks her, watching Azula rub the dried leaves between her fingers and sniff deeply. Something about her changes, a strange look coming to her face as she replies to Sokka and ignores his question.

‘Give your sister my thanks. It will not go undrunk.’

‘Right, cool. I didn’t think you knew the meaning of thank-you.’

‘Sokka!’ Hakoda hisses at him, chasing his son outside and getting in another long conversation about the tribe that Sokka hadn’t wanted to discuss in front of Azula. Hakoda learns of the things he’s missed, the treaties that have been signed and doesn’t understand Sokka’s look of chagrin until the end of his speech.

‘I’m sorry, you know. About making you do this. She has to be a pain.’

‘…no. _No,_ Sokka. Azula is…’ he thinks of her curled up against him, walking two fingers up his sweat-soaked chest as he choked on laughter at the truly awful joke she’d made ‘…fine company.’

Sokka gives him a weird look, before shrugging and saying his goodbyes. It isn’t the last time he visits, but neither are his visits—or Katara’s, for that matter—regular, or on a strict timetable. Hakoda almost forces Azula into normality again, hunting and foraging across the tundra, so they aren’t having sex all the time.

He makes her eat more, too, which she doesn’t protest in the slightest. Azula drinks the tea Katara sends her, too and Hakoda notices the lack of bloody rags, having guiltily used the appearance of them to keep track of the months, eventually connecting the lack of blood to the tea itself.

‘I’d nearly forgotten that existed,’ he says pointedly, only a little proud that he’d remembered. Azula rolls her eyes, finishes her tea, then takes him to bed.

‘The best part about this tea,’ she tells him afterwards with an exhausted voice, already half asleep, ‘-is that it also prevents pregnancy.’

‘Perfect,’ Hakoda murmurs.

That night, he dreams of a child.

* * *

The thought that he might be caught by his children is always a threat. That they will be disgusted by his behaviour is a certainty, always caught on the fact that he’s bedding a woman stuck square between them in age—not to mention the fact that she is his prisoner.

Lately, however, now that winter has come and the sun never rises—Azula sleeping heavier than ever, almost always tired without Agni to light her from the inside—Hakoda has had more disturbing ideas. He dreams of a world where he lives with Azula in their igloo for years on end, with a young child that has his brown hair and her golden eyes, that smiles like Azula does when she’s engaged in conversation and _happy_. He imagines Azula growing older, hair pulled up into a bun on top of her head with his blue beads tied in on a braid amongst all the fine strands.

Azula almost seems to sense his thoughts. ‘I won’t be here forever,’ she says, ‘So, let’s use what time we have.’ And if sometimes, he braids his own beads in her hair mere hours after Sokka or Katara have left them again after visiting, she doesn’t say anything—not until one night, when he brushes his hand over them one too many times.

‘They mean something to you,’ she guesses. ‘A claiming of some sort. What title have you wrought upon me?’

‘You would be angry to know it,’ says Hakoda, knowing his words will only invite the true answer. At her expectant eyebrow, he reluctantly tells her, ‘You wear my beads to show you are mine. My wife.’

‘And what if I don’t want to be?’

‘Then give them back.’

Azula twirls one of the loose braids around on her finger, humming playfully. ‘No, I think not. You Water Tribe—always doing small things, instead of large and extravagant.’

‘It’s our way.’

‘And I like it. Simple is good, on occasion.’

Hakoda smiles, then leans over to kiss her fondly. Azula, for once, does not lead him into sex—taking the kiss softly and returning it with a fragile sort of tenderness. He pretends not to notice how she clutches her bead that night, refusing to return it the next day. The next time Sokka visits, barking about thievery, Azula flutters her eyelashes at him and asks how else she could have gotten it—and the green look on his son’s face proves all Hakoda’s worst fears.

Yet, he still makes the time to tell Sokka that he doesn’t mind it.

‘She needs somewhere to belong,’ Hakoda intones in his best Dad Voice. ‘You’re not the one who’s been here, watching her.’

‘You- what, Dad?’ Sokka shakes his head. ‘You think she’s found peace or something? Azula’s a crazy lady. You’re lucky she’s not killed you in your sleep.’

‘Oh, she’s certainly tried.’

‘She’s _tried?’_

‘Obviously, I didn’t succeed,’ Azula interjects, joining them outside. A storm is blowing in, bringing cold winds with it with it and Hakoda for a moment just looks at her, standing outside their igloo in her elk-moose hide coat and reds, snow drifting down as his dark blue bead swinging freely in her loose hair—they’d forgotten to braid it last night, caught up in Sokka’s visit.

‘Obviously,’ Hakoda teases, ‘You’ll have to try harder, next time.’

‘Yes, _much_ harder,’ she purrs, smirking at him. The innuendo passes by his son, who points his finger at Azula and threatens her for if she tries to kill him again. This time when he leaves, Hakoda deliberately pins Azula to their bed.

‘Harder—that’s what you wanted, yes?’ He mutters, driving into her with force. Azula moans, jerking her hips against his wantonly, their hips crashing against each other. Hakoda feels how he fills her to the brim, every push sliding her further up the furs, so he hauls her up higher, manually impaling her on his cock. Every thrust makes her yell, eyes teary as she calls out his name.

_‘Hakoda, Hakoda, please, **Hakoda** -’_

He gives it all he’s got, filling her with his seed and sliding out of her swollen cunt. Azula reaches up to grab his shoulders, hips still jerking, her pleasure not reached.

‘Hakoda, _please,’_ she begs and if Hakoda was a younger man, he might have fucked her again. But unfortunately, he’s not that younger man, so instead her buries three fingers inside her, knuckle deep. ‘More,’ Azula pleads, ‘It’s not enough.’

‘Not enough?’ Hakoda repeats, before tentatively adding another finger, then another. He curls his thumb up to press down as he goes in and out, but Azula digs her nails into his back.

_‘More!’_

‘Spirits, you’re insatiable, princess,’ he swears, before taking his hand out, ignoring her complaints as he curls his fist. _You want more? You’ll get more._ For a long moment, nothing really happens as he presses in, Azula’s expression twisting into one of alarm before he finally stretches her out, pushing deeper and deeper. He watches as Azula’s eyes close, her chest rising as if to get away even as she gasps.

_‘Ah- ahh- AH!’_ His name is a whisper, then she shrieks as he twists just slightly, obviously catching her pleasure point. Hakoda feels the suction as he pulls back, pushing back in and attempting to expand his fist the tiniest bit. Azula comes unexpectedly in a hot gush, mewling like a leopard-cat as fluid soaks his wrist.

‘Is this enough?’ Hakoda asks her, watching her eyes flutter open, her head shaking mutely. ‘Oh really?’ he questions, knowing this is less a want and more her pride. He doesn’t think he can fit his slack cock in there, but… ‘You asked for it,’ he rumbles, deep in his chest. He sees her shudder where she lays, watching him lie down so his mouth can latch onto her as-of-yet unabused bud, hiding how his other hand slips around to join the fist already inside her cunt.

_‘HAKODA!’_ She yells, bucking against him. _‘Ohhhh…’_

He fucks her without his cock and the way she falls apart is glorious—satisfying a primal need in him to see her lying on his bed with a heaving chest, cunt dripping with both her fluids and his seed. The heat she puts off is enough that he almost can’t bear to touch her, arms wrapping around her middle as he presses a rough kiss to her abdomen.

‘Coming here was the best thing I ever did,’ she murmurs weakly, voice hoarse. Hakoda can’t help but agree, but peels himself off her to go bring a lukewarm pot of water for them to clean up with. Azula lays there, letting him drag the cloth along her skin, catching his free hand over her stomach and holding it there, where she’s comfortable. Her mouth moves silently for a moment, before she finally blurts out, ‘I love you.’

Hakoda stills, not sure whether to believe her. Reality bleeds back in, but then he sees her face, so vulnerable and scared. He can’t question her, not now, not here in their bed with her hand trembling in his own.

‘I care very, very deeply for you,’ he says quietly. ‘I am not sure if it is yet love—excuse me, for that.’ He hates how she just nods, wanting to see her argue with him and _make_ him say it. Azula’s insecurities are rooted in abandonment. Anyone with eyes can see it.

He reaches up to kiss her forehead, then her nose and then her mouth, holding her close for a moment and letting her cling to him, their hands still trapped together between their bodies. She is all _fire._

And Hakoda doesn't mind that at all.


End file.
